A/N Sorry I'm such a bad updater but school's almost over and I got a bunch of exams to study for peeps! Here's the new chapter XD Thanks for all the reviews and alerts and all that good stuff hehe. And yay we are over 300 reviews! Enjoy the chapter!

Disclaimer: I do not own Twilight, SM does.

Seth and Paul seemed to snap out of their shock to see her awake and ran over to her. Seth was the first to reach her and immediately embraced her. "Don't scare me like that again."

Bella snorted. "I'm perfectly fine. Two measly vampires can't take me down."

Paul smiled proudly. "That's my sis."

Bella grinned back but sobered up as she remembered her dream. "We have to get back to La Push as soon as possible."

Chapter Fourteen: Reality Check

Paul heaved a sigh of relief. "I can't say I blame you. I don't think my nose could take it much longer."

Seth glared at Paul, having sense enough to notice when something was wrong. He looked at Bella in concern. "Did something happen, Bella?"

She shook her head slowly, as if she wasn't too sure. "Yes. No. I don't know. I just have a feeling of foreboding. And my dream…"

Rosalie interrupted her. "There you go with the dream thing again. I don't know what has happened to you while we were gone, but obviously something isn't right up there if you know what I mean."

Bella began to shake in anger. "Listen to me, bitch. I don't know what your fucking problem is, but if you keep testing me, I will rip your precious hair off of your head and burn it. And don't think I won't enjoy every second of it."

Everyone gasped at Bella, still not used to her using that kind of language. Even Rosalie appeared to be shocked into silence. Bella was still shaking in anger, only calming down when Seth came up behind her, rubbing soothing circles on her back until her shaking gradually subsided. Bella winked at him and kissed him on the cheek in thanks. It wouldn't have been a good idea to antagonize the very people she would need help from.

Seth, however, seemed to have reached the breaking point with Rosalie's behavior. His wolf had not been able to claim his mate yet, which made him focus even more on her protection until he was able to. It was not smart for anyone to be hostile towards his mate. He turned to Carlisle. "If you cannot control your..daughter and stop her from provoking my mate, I will not hesitate to start removing her limbs."

Emmett shifted himself protectively in front of Rosalie and glanced at Seth warily. "Hey now, there's no need for that."

Carlisle looked embarrassed. "I apologize for my daughter." He frowned at her. "She will behave like the lady we raised her to be."

Paul snorted. "Fat chance of that happening. Once a bitch, always a bitch, I always say."

Bella glared at him, silently daring him to continue speaking. He spluttered in disbelief. "Oh so you can talk bad to her, but I can't? Whatever." He sulked in his seat and pretended not to see Bella rolling her eyes at him.

Rosalie gestured at Bella and Paul incredulously. "You see this. They've insulted us in our own home and yet we have to be civil to them?"

Carlisle sighed. "Bella has reason to be upset with us, Rose."

Rosalie huffed. "Oh, so we have to baby her just because we left her. It was for her own good anyway. We should never have become involved with her in the first place."

Bella jumped up and lunged for Rosalie, bypassing Emmett, and phasing on the fly. She tackled Rosalie and snarling, held her down by one paw. Rosalie's eyes widened as she realized that she had gone too far. Bella's teeth were millimeters away from Rosalie's throat before anyone even tried to do anything.

Emmett, juggling between protecting his mate and not wanting to hurt his sister, turned to Paul for help. "Aren't you going to do anything?"

Paul laughed. "Hell no! I haven't seen anything this entertaining since Jacob found out that Seth imprinted on Bella. Damn, I wish I had popcorn."

Esme looked at the others pleadingly. "Please stop this!"

But still, no one budged. They all secretly felt that Rosalie had it coming.

Suddenly, Bella went rigid, and seconds later, a heartbreaking howl went through her.

Seth's and Paul's eyes widened. Something terrible must have happened back at home. Seth wanted to protect his mate, but without knowing what was going on, there was nothing he could do. Remembering that Jasper was an empath, he turned towards him and was shocked to see that the vampire had fallen to his knees. "What's wrong? What is she feeling?"

Jasper struggled to stand up. "She is feeling so much grief. It's overwhelming."

Bella had by then released Rosalie, who quickly ran into the arms of Emmett. Bella was shaking on the ground and appeared to be struggling with something.

Edward turned to Seth. "What's wrong with her?"

Seth's face was now determined. "Wolves don't have the capacity to deal with human emotions. I suspect she is trying to phase back, but can't because she's too upset. Paul, help me get her outside."

Alice was worried for her friend. "Why?"

Seth sighed. "We cannot help her if we don't know what's going on. I was going to phase to try to calm her down and I don't think this house could take three wolves phasing inside of it."

Paul and Seth slowly walked towards Bella, not wanting to startle her. She didn't seem to even notice as her eyes were focused on the events taking place elsewhere. They carefully picked her up and carried her outside.

Seth turned to Paul. "Maybe I should be the only one to phase. I don't want to overwhelm her."

Paul glared at him. "Hell no. She's my sister and I want to see what's going on."

Seth sighed but decided not to argue with him anymore. Ignoring the Cullens, who stood behind them, they removed their shorts and phased.

A/N Seth italics Paul underlined italics Bella bold italics Embry bold underlined italics

Bella, honey. What happened?

Bella didn't respond, simply saying no, no, no over and over again in her mind.

I'm so sorry, Bells. Even Embry appeared to be grief-stricken.

What the hell happened? Paul was beginning to lose his patience, while Seth was still trying to get through to Bella.

Embry was clearly very upset as he told them. Me and Quil were patrolling and our shift was almost over so I told him he could go home to Claire since she was staying at Emily's for a few days. I was just getting near to check the perimeter around Charlie's house when I smelled a leech. I howled and not too long after Sam, Jared, and Jacob showed up. As we neared the house we…smelled…blood. Embry let out a shuddering breath. We pretty much broke the door down when we smelled it. And there was a leech, with dreadlocks standing over Charlie's…body. We were too late to save him, but we took care of the leech. Sam ordered me to stay phased until I calmed down and he said that he would be calling Bella soon.

Inside the house, they heard a phone going off, but they ignored it for the moment. Seth walked closer to Bella and nudged her softly. Come on babe, you have to calm down and phase back.

Paul seemed to be in too much shock to be of any help. He hadn't always had it easy but Charlie had always been there for him when things got rough for him. It was just hard to swallow that a leech had attacked someone who was close to not only him, but to most of the pack.

Bella seemed to slightly relax due to Seth's presence but made no move to phase back. It's all my fault, if I had just stayed behind for a bit longer, we would have been able to protect him.

Seth growled. Bella, this was NOT your fault. It was the fault of that red-haired leech. He walked over and nudged her with his nose. We will find her and kill her for what she did. But for now, you need to phase back, babe. Please.

Not able to deny her imprint anything, she forced herself to calm down enough for her to phase back, followed by Seth and Paul.

Paul grimaced and yelled towards the house. "Can we get some clothes out here? I don't exactly enjoy seeing my sister naked!"

Seconds later, Esme came out with a handful of clothes for all of them. Keeping her eyes averted, she laid them down and quickly disappeared back into the house.

Paul sighed. "I guess we'll have to endure the stench." He picked up the clothes and beat them against the ground, as if he were trying to get rid of the smell, and handed it to Seth and Bella.

They quickly put on the clothes, and started walking back into the house. Seth put his arms around Bella as she leaned heavily against him.

They were met by the worried eyes of the Cullens. Esme looked at Bella with concern. "What happened?"

Paul couldn't control his growl. "You happened. If it wasn't for your filthy bloodsucking coven, none of this would have happened!"

Esme flinched and tears filled her eyes. Rosalie hissed at Paul. "Oh please, mutt. Whatever happened to Bella would have nothing to do with us; we haven't seen her in months."

Bella lifted her head and stared at Rosalie with unconcealed hatred, though there was hurt lurking beneath. "Oh so you never had any confrontations with a certain group of nomads, killed the leader, and chose not to kill his mate? Now that I think about it, maybe that's what you wanted. You probably planned for Victoria to come after me in vengeance, hoping that she'd kill me so you wouldn't have to take care of the mess you left behind. You know what, fuck the woman in my dreams; I would rather die by Victoria's hand than ever ask for the help of this coven."

Everyone stiffened in response and their gasps were heard.

Edward looked at her confusedly. "What do you mean, love? Victoria wasn't James' mate."

Jasper snorted and glanced at Bella apologetically, before narrowing his eyes at the rest of the Cullens. "I told you that she was. But none of you believed me because Edward didn't read any sort of relationship between Victoria and James. Newsflash, Edward can only hear what a person is thinking at the time, and its not like we're all constantly thinking about who our mate is, especially since James appeared to be focused on hunting Bella."

Carlisle, ashamed, apologized to Jasper. "I'm sorry, Jasper. I have only recently realized that I have relied on Edward and Alice far too much on decisions when they see or hear things only subjectively. I will try to take your expertise into account from now on."

Rosalie snorted. "What proof do we have that Bella is even telling the truth? This could be some misguided attempt on her part to bring us all back to Forks in order to win back the affections of Edward."

Seth and Paul immediately began to shake in anger and Carlisle and Esme looked disapprovingly at Rosalie.

Bella, putting a restraining hand on Seth and Paul, took a deep breath before deciding to look at the one Cullen that she retained the most respect for, Jasper. "Oh yes, I'm the one who has been begging Edward to come back to me." Her sarcasm was hard to miss. "I have a mate. My proof is that my father was killed today by Laurent." Tears filled her eyes as she continued. "My proof is the disappearances of innocent people in and near Forks and Seattle. My proof is that Victoria has been sighted and chased until she was very near the treaty line."

Though she did feel remorse for acting so rudely towards Bella, Rosalie couldn't stand the fact that Bella didn't make eye contact with her when she spoke, as if she were ignoring her presence. "What? Too scared to look me in the eye?"

Bella looked at Rosalie in exasperated amazement. "Why must you make everything about you, Rosalie? I chose not to look at you because I have absolutely no respect for you or any of you for that matter, except for Jasper. He is always looked down upon by this coven because you believe him to be the weakest among you, when he is the exact opposite."

Edward snorted. "Did you forget that he attacked you on your birthday?"

Bella narrowed her eyes at him and faced the Cullens full on. "He is the strongest among you because, unlike the rest of you who only have to deal with their own bloodlust, he had to deal with all of yours. And don't pretend like any of you didn't thirst for my blood besides Carlisle, because none of you could even stand to be within the same room with me when it happened. Of course Jasper would have slip-ups; he fed from humans for decades and has to deal with all of your bloodlust every day. Instead of being treated like he is, he should be treated as your most valued coven member."

Peter started clapping. "Preach on, woman. Preach on." He was silenced by a slap to the head by Charlotte, though she didn't hide her grin. She was happy that the Cullens were finally seeing Jasper for who he truly was.

The Cullens looked at Jasper guiltily but he just shrugged it off, though a part of him was happy that Bella had stood up for him. She was more observant than he thought.

Carlisle did feel terrible about leaving Bella and about how he treated Jasper, but he was saddened at Bella's view of his family. "Bella, why do you keep referring to our family as a coven? We are a family, much more civilized than other covens."

Bella sighed with irritation. "You may think you're a family, but it's only a sad attempt to cover up the monsters you really are."

Every word Bella said hurt them and Jasper felt that she was going too far. "Now Bella, the family was miserable about leaving you. None of us were the same, Emmett considers you a sister, Alice is your best friend, and Carlisle and Esme feel like you're their daughter."

Bella narrowed her eyes at him, definitely taking away some of the respect points she had given him. She raised her hand and began lowering her fingers as she talked about each of them, ticking them off one by one. "Let's see, I'll start with Carlisle. What kind of father abandons his daughter in her time of need? A real father would do whatever he could to protect his daughter, no matter the circumstance. I needed you, my life felt as if it was collapsing around me and I NEEDED you to be my strength or even a shoulder to cry on." Carlisle, ashamed, dropped his head.

She turned to Esme. "And what kind of mother leaves her supposed daughter. A real mother would comfort her daughter and do whatever she could to alleviate her pain. She would be there to listen to my problems or support me in my decisions. You weren't there." Esme couldn't control her tearless sobs.

Bella faced Emmett. "You always said I was your little sister. I don't know about you, but an older brother protects their sister and would never abandon her when she needs them." Emmett's eyes were troubled and guilty.

Bella turned to Alice. "You were my best friend. I use the past tense because you were my best friend up until the point that you left me. Did you know that I emailed you everyday that you were gone? I know you closed your account, but it made me feel slightly better, at least until I realized that you would never read it."

Bella looked at Edward. "And Edward I loved you so much. I was willing to give up everything for you; children, my family, friends. But you weren't even willing to consider it. You broke me and I wasn't myself until recently, when I realized that you definitely weren't worth the effort of me holding on."

Bella sighed. "Jasper and Rosalie, I imagined that one day we would become close, but that dream faded away when you left. I don't blame you for leaving at all since I was not able to have a relationship with Jasper and Rosalie obviously didn't care." She shrugged. "I don't know about you, but nothing any of you have done even remotely resembles a family at all."

Rosalie glared at Bella, furious that she had ripped apart each member of her family. "And yet you're here asking us for our help."

Bella grimaced. "Trust me when I say that it really was a last resort. For some reason, I need you to do this. I figured you'd want to finish cleaning up the mess you all started. As soon as this mess is over with, you can return to your blissfully happy lives and continue to forget that I even existed."

The Cullens wanted to argue, but finally seemed to realize that perhaps the way to make things up to Bella was to help her and to use action to show her that they still cared. Though Rosalie came off to be furious and hateful of Bella, she deep down was starting to like her.

Carlisle cleared his throat. "We will help you with this. And will hopefully gain your forgiveness. Jasper's expertise should certainly be helpful in this situation."

Bella smirked. "Ah yes, the Major and his two Captains would be incredibly useful."

Jasper as well as Peter and Charlotte turned to look at Bella in surprise. "How did you know those names?"

Bella winked at them. "I have my ways. Perhaps I'll let you in on the secret later. Besides, I'm sure Victoria has been creating newborns."

Jasper, still shocked, nodded in agreement. "That would coincide with the disappearances and how Victoria has been able to get so close to you. How did your pack subdue Laurent? He could be used to find out more information."

Paul, who had remained silent along with Seth until now, both feeling the need to let Bella get all of her pain and frustrations out, couldn't control his laughter. "Is he fucking serious? How did we subdue the leech?" Paul clutched his stomach, not able to say more.

Jasper looked at Seth for an explanation. With a slight smirk, he answered. "We destroyed him."

Suddenly, they heard a loud, keening wail come from upstairs, before a flash of white stood in front of them. It was Irina and her pain and grief were unmistakable in her eyes. She glanced at them accusingly. "You killed my mate?" She almost shrieked the last word.

Paul glared at her. "Oh I'm sorry. Was he a friend of yours? We normally kill the leeches that maim innocent humans."

Bella shot a look at Paul. "Must you be so insincere?" She turned to Irina. "He wasn't really your mate. And even if he was, you should be thankful you didn't have to spend the rest of your existence with such an evil, lying, backstabbing piece of shit."

Paul snorted. "And that was so much better."

Bella didn't respond as her attention was on Irina, who had lunged at her as she finished. Irina was held back as the rest of the Denalis blurred into view.

Eleazar raised an eyebrow at Carlisle. "We allow your visitors into our home and look how they treat us? By indifferently admitting to killing Irina's mate?" His anger was apparent in every word.

Bella decided to interrupt again. "Excuse me. Mr..uhh..shit..erm…"

Eleazar glared at her. "Eleazar."

Bella nodded. "Right, Eleazar. As I said before, Laurent wasn't Irina's mate."

Irina was snarling in Tanya's and Kate's grasp, ignoring the shocks Kate gave her to try to calm her down.

Eleazar sighed, secretly happy that Laurent wasn't mated to Irina. There was no mistaking Laurent's unsavory character. "And you know this how?"

Bella rolled her eyes. "Well for one, a real mate couldn't leave their mate behind for any extended period of time, obviously. Let alone for another woman. As soon as a mate realizes that they have met their mate, then all other loyalties fade in comparison to it. If Laurent really was Irina's mate he would never have left her and would have actually went against Victoria rather than work with her since he knows that his mate is close to the Cullens. It's all logic, really. Plus, I have it on very good authority that Irina will find her real mate when you guys help us fight Victoria."

Peter glared at Bella. "Hey! I was going to say that!"

Bella stuck her tongue out at him. "Well too bad."

Eleazar's eyes widened. "How did you-" His eyes widened even more as he did a double-take and scrutinized her.

After a few minutes, Bella waved her hand in front of his face, ignoring Seth who tried to hold her back. "I think I broke him."

Paul glanced worriedly at Bella. "Um..Bella…how did you know that?"

Eleazar now gazed at Bella in wonder. "She's a sponge. She can use the power of anyone she comes in contact with."

Bella shrugged, unsurprised. "Tell me something I don't know."

Seth almost vibrated in his fury. His mate had hidden something from him. "Why did you not inform me of this, Bella?"

Bella sighed. "Chill, babe. I didn't know there was a name for it, but the woman in my dreams said I would be gaining more powers, so I guess this is it."

Seth narrowed his eyes at her. "We will be talking about this later."

Bella frowned but didn't argue with him. "So, can we get this show on the road now? Jasper, hit Irina with some of that mojo shit cause we need to leave and soon." Jasper obeyed her and Irina slumped in the arms of her sisters.

Peter scowled and turned to Charlotte. "Char, she's stealing my lines. It's not fair. I'm the one who reveals cryptic know-it-all shit and she's taking my job!"

Charlotte shrugged. "Maybe this is good for you. It might take down your ego a bit."

Peter pouted and then sighed. "I guess I can share, but I get the next one!"

Bella rolled her eyes and walked over to their bags, grabbing the cell phone they'd brought. It had ten missed calls. "I'd better call Sam back and tell him that we're on the way."

A/N Yes Bella is really OOC but I really can't stand that she had no backbone in the books. I know I made Rosalie sound like a huge bitch but don't worry she's had a reality check and while she will still be a bitch, she'll be a better bitch? Ah well, you'll just have to wait and see. I know Seth is usually pretty laid-back, but come on, he's staying in a house with a bunch of vamps, two of which are human-drinkers, plus he's got Paul breathing down his neck, I think he's allowed to be a bit stressed and OOC. Next chapter, they'll be back in Forks and they'll have to learn how to get along. And maybe more of Bella's powers become known XD Review please!